AACSB International’s 2013 Accreditation Standards:
Implications for Faculty and Deans
Morgan P. Miles1
School of Management
University of Tasmania
Launceston TAS 7250 Australia
Morgan.miles@utas.edu.au
Kirk Heriot and Linda U. Hadley
Turner College of Business
Columbus State University
Columbus, GA 31907
Heriot_kirk@columbusstate.edu
Geralyn McClure Franklin
Nelson Rusche College of Business
Stephen F. Austin State University
Nacogdoches, TX 75962
franklingm@sfasu.edu
Mary F. Hazeldine
Department of Marketing & Logistics
Georgia Southern University
Statesboro, Georgia 30460-8154
hazeldine@georgiasouthern.edu
1
Contact Author
1
Abstract
Higher education, particularly collegiate management and business education, has undergone
significant changes since AACSB International’s last major revision of accreditation standards in
2003. These changes include incorporating the impact of global financial crises, increasing
globalization, integrating new teaching technologies, and the emergence of large for-profit
competitors. Recently, AACSB’s Blue Ribbon Committee on Accreditation Quality (BRC)
developed a new set of standards to address the role of collegiate business schools in the
turbulent environment of the 21st Century. Adopted by AACSB accredited members on April 8,
2013, the new standards place emphasis on (1) innovation, (2) impact, and (3) engagement, while
retaining the 2003 standards’ focus on (4) quality, (5) assurance of learning (AOL), and (6)
accreditation processes (Bisoux, 2013). Given the prominence of AACSB in management
education policy and practice, this paper presents a discussion of how these “new” standards
differ from the previous accreditation standards and implications for business faculty and deans.
The study is concluded by offering suggestions for future research on the new standards.
Keywords: AACSB, Business Accreditation, Management Education, Collegiate Business
Education
2
Introduction
“A management agenda dominated exclusively by managerial self-interest and the pursuit
of profit will gradually lead to an impoverished and dehumanized view of management.”
Birnik and Billsberry (2008: 995)
AACSB International: The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business was
founded in 1916 and first adopted accreditation standards in 1919. Through the years, these
standards have been modified to emphasize quality and continuous improvement in changing
collegiate business education environments. Since 1991, AACSB has made substantial changes
to the standards three times, again in 2003, and most recently in 2013.
In April 2013, AACSB’s accredited members voted to modify the business standards
after more than a year of discussions.2 Prior to the adoption of the mission-oriented standards in
1991, AACSB membership consisted mostly of larger, research-oriented business schools. The
1991 change in the standards provided an opportunity for many schools with a predominantly
teaching emphasis to pursue AACSB accreditation as long as teaching was a fundamental part of
the school’s mission (AACSB International, 2003). Most of the recent research about AACSB
accreditation has explored topics about the standards and the effects of the changes including:
(1) perceptions of business school deans about the 1991 standards revision (Mayes, Heide, and
Smith, 1993); (2) changes in faculty workloads (Henninger, 1998); (3) the relative emphasis
placed on teaching, research, and service (McKenna, Cotton, and Van Auken, 1995); (4) the cost
of initial accreditation (Heriot, Austin, and Franklin, 2009); and (5) the impact that changes in
standards may have on business faculty (Miles, Hazeldine, and Munilla, 2004).
AACSB’s accounting standards were also modified by a vote of the accredited accounting
program representatives on April 8, 2013.
2
3
All successful organizations must deal with change as an inevitable reality of the
dynamic world in which they operate. Business educators were alarmed at the study by Porter
and McKibbin (1988) that questioned the relevance of business education. Their three-year
study offered advice about, but not limited to, strategic planning in business education, faculty
preparation, and curriculum. In fact, much of the impetus for the development of 1991 standards
was the criticism Porter and McKibbin directed at business programs in leading universities and
colleges across the United States.3
Purpose
The adoption of the 2013 accreditation standards was a major strategic decision and
represents a shift in the strategy of AACSB International. Now that the organization has
formulated a new strategy as represented by the 2013 standards, it is incumbent on those that will
be affected by these new standards to prepare for the change. As AACSB International begins
the process of implementing its new standards, the faculty who teach in these programs and the
deans who lead them must consider the implications. These changes will also have a long-term
effect on management and business education over the next decade. Thus, the purpose of this
essay is to consider the implications of the 2013 AACSB Accreditation Standards. The purpose
of the present study is two-fold: What are the implications of the 2013 AACSB Accreditation
Standards for (1) business faculty; and (2) business deans?
Prior Research
The literature on AACSB accreditation can be organized into two broad categories: (1)
what is the value of accreditation, and (2) AACSB standards and implications. Research into the
3
The American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB), now AACSB
International, was a major sponsor of the study
4
first category is exemplified by several studies. In considering the value of accreditation,
Trapnell (2007) argues that accreditation by AACSB is an effective way to provide external
validation of the quality of a business program. Durand and McGuire (2005) noted that
accreditation provides legitimization for the business school and offers students and other
stakeholders external validation that the business school is managerially relevant and conforming
to a sound and globally-accepted business curriculum. Interestingly, while value is
conceptualized as the differences between benefits and costs (see Kotler and Keller, 2012) until
Heriot, et.al (2009) conducted a study related to accreditation which evaluated the cost of
accreditation for 10 college business programs seeking initial accreditation from AACSB
International, no studies related to the cost of business accreditation had been published.
Research focused on the AACSB accreditation standards seems to have followed a
general pattern over the past 25 years. Initial research makes the case that a change in the
standards is needed. Subsequent research offers advice on how to implement the change,
evaluates perceptions of those affected by the change, and assesses how well it was actually
being done, or eventually criticizes the standards for some reason or another. Clearly, the study
by Porter and McKibbin (1988) represented the starting point for the evolution of the standards.
Their study was funded by AACSB. Yet, it was highly critical of business programs in the
United States. It was this criticism, as well as changes in the external business environment, that
led to the adoption of the 1991 standards, which marked the first philosophical change in the
accreditation standards since the initial standards were adopted in 1919.
Among the first studies to consider the 1991 AACSB standards was a study by Mayes, et
al. (1993). They conducted a survey of business school deans to assess their perceptions of the
1991 AACSB accreditation standards. Their research classified schools as Category I, II, or III.
5
Category I schools are doctoral degree granting schools with accredited undergraduate and
graduate degree programs. Category II schools consists of accredited schools without doctoral
programs, and Category III schools are non-accredited schools. These categories were based
upon Porter and McKibbin’s (1988) classification. While the categories did not distinguish
between accredited and non-accredited programs with and without masters programs, they were
useful as a basis of comparison.
The 1991 standards were also the subject of further research. Cotton, McKenna, Van
Auken, and Yeider (1993) asked deans of accredited and non-accredited collegiate schools of
business to offer their perspectives on the impact of the then new (1991) AACSB accreditation
standards upon the mix of teaching, research, and service. They concluded that neither
accredited schools nor schools seeking accreditation “saw no mandate for change in the new
AACSB accreditation standards” (McKenna, et al., p. 10, 1995). On the other hand, deans from
non-accredited schools that did not anticipate seeking accreditation believed they would have to
change if they were to meet the new standards.
A series of additional studies followed those of Mayes et al. (1993) and Cotton et al.
(1995). Many of these studies criticized the adoption of mission-linked standards. Jantzen and
Yunker (2000) were especially critical of the 1991 standards. Among their primary objections
was the contention that teaching effectiveness is much harder to evaluate than research
productivity. They also asserted that students needed scholars in the classroom who had
demonstrated their expertise through their research.
In response to external criticism of business education, AACSB International modified
the standards again in 2003 to better fit the global perspective. The primary change in these
6
standards was the adoption of faculty sufficiency models to include participating (primary) and
supporting (secondary) faculty and faculty qualifications models to include academically
qualified, professionally qualified, or other (nonqualified) with corresponding proportions of the
faculty mandated to be participating and academically qualified. Another major change in these
standards was the requirement that business programs adopt learning goals and measure the
direct progress of the learning associated with those goals (Thompson, 2004). This change
represented an evolution in the emphasis on becoming more accountable to external
stakeholders.
The 2003 standards encouraged additional to research on the impact of the 2003 AACSB
accreditation standards. Some of these research studies were interpretative and/or prescriptive,
while other research that offered scathing criticism of the new standards and how they negatively
affected members or might negatively affect members. Among the earliest interpretive types of
research was a study by Miles et al. (2004). At the time of their study, the 2003 standards were
quite new, and it is likely that only a few “pilot” programs had been evaluated based upon them.
Miles et al. (2004) offered their observations of specific issues that would influence business
faculty. They pointed out that the strategic management, participant, and assessment standards
would have a serious impact on a variety of faculty activities including, but not limited to,
balancing workload, research productivity expectations, and curriculum management.
Another example of the interpretive studies is the work of Weldy, Spake, and Sneath
(2008). They bravely tackled the dual challenge of accreditation by both SACS and AACSB.
They offered advice on “best practices” in response to what they described as changes that “have
had a major impact on colleges and schools of business” (Weldy et al. 2008, p. 20). They
summarized those change in the standards as follows:
7
“In an effort to address the challenges faced by colleges and schools of business to meet
accreditation standards, many programs are adopting best practices. Some important best
practices that should be considered include: focus on the mission, establish objectives for
program performance, widespread involvement in the assessment process, use of direct
measurement techniques focused on skills and knowledge, and processes for closing the
loop by making improvements based on assessment results,” (2008, p. 20).
These changes required a shift in processes and data from input criteria to output measures that
demonstrate quality and continuous improvement. AACSB also shortened the accreditation cycle
from ten- to five-year periods. Other standards did not change but were made more explicit
pertaining to what was required to meet the standard by detailing the specific requirements in a
“basis-for-judgment” section (Thompson, 2004). The 2003 standards for initial accreditation and
reaccreditation adopted by AACSB focused on three distinct areas: the strategic management
process, qualifications for faculty members and students, and assurance of learning (AOL)
(Weldy et al. 2008, p. 15). Rather than embrace the modification in the standards, many
business programs struggled with the process needed to measure learning (Martell, 2007).
Nonetheless, she contended that progress was made in efforts to assess learning based upon AOL
practices from surveys conducted in both 2004 and 2006.
Not all scholars had a positive reaction to the adoption of the 2003 standards.
Contrasting with the work of Martell (2007) and Weldy et al. (2008), is the work of Pringle and
Michel (2007). The results of their survey of 138 AACSB-accredited business schools led them
to conclude that most schools had not adopted very strong assessment of learning programs to
meet AACSB’s 2003 standards. They specifically reported the continued use of indirect rather
than direct measures of the assessment of learning. Likewise, Walck (2009: 384) suggested that
8
“business school accreditors such as AACSB lag in their commitment to sustainability
education.”
Lowrie and Willmott (2009) questioned the motivation by AACSB to adopt the 1991 and
2003 standards that focused on schools being guided by their strategic mission. They argued that
the change in the standards was followed by incredible growth by AACSB. They note that
(Lowrie and Willmott, 2009, p. 411)
“The change to a mission-linked architecture was motivated, it is argued, primarily by
expansionist, rather than pedagogical, considerations. It coincided with a reduction in the
number of US research-based schools unaccredited, the inability of many US-business
schools to meet AACSB’s previous standards, the emergence of a rival accreditation
agency (Association of Collegiate Business Schools and Programs) formed to target this
market, and international competition from other accreditation bodies.”
The value proposition of AACSB accreditation has also been hotly debated. For
example, Julian and Ofori-Dankwa (2006) examined the usefulness of accreditation by three
different accrediting bodies including AACSB and found four common limitations: (1) over
formalization resulting in an “accreditocracy,” (2) documentation trumping actual performance,
(3) an over-reliance on hard data, experience, and context specific sense making, and (4) the
unsustainability of continuous improvement. Ashkanasy (2008) compiled a set of three papers
by Romero (2008), Zammuto (2008), and Moskal, Ellis, and Keon (2008) in a subsequent issue
to provide evidence as a partial rebuttal to Julian and Ofori-Dankwa’s (2006) contentions.
Romero (2008) suggested that AACSB accreditation is not a constraint to innovation but may
facilitate better strategy making and innovation in a more globally-competitive environment due
to better data, best practice dissemination, and information sharing.
9
Thus, one should not be surprised that the 2003 standards have now been replaced by
another new set of standards adopted in April 2013. AACSB’s accredited members voted to
revise the accreditation standards as a strategic response to the dramatic changes in the business
school environment that have resulted from a very turbulent external environment that included
(1) the impact of Wall Street’s meltdown, the global financial crises, and changing economic
conditions; (2) increasing globalization; (3) new teaching technologies; (4) competitive threats
from AMBA, EQUIS, and other accrediting bodies; and (5) critical assessments of the impact of
accreditation on shaping strategy and process in business schools (see Julian and Ofori-Dankwa,
2006; Ashkanasy, 2008; Romero, 2008; Zammuto,2008; Moskal, Ellis, and Keon, 2008). The
purpose of the newest standards, much as in the reasoning for the 1991 and 2003 standard
revisions, was to enhance a “professional school model” and provide accredited institutions a
positional advantage in this hyper-competitive global market for higher education (see Slone and
LaCava, 1993).
The 2013 Accreditation Standards
The 2013 standards are classified into four major categories: (1) strategic management
and innovation, (2) students, faculty, and staff participants, (3) learning and teaching, and (4)
academic and professional engagement (Biz Ed, 2013; AACSB, 2013). While all standards
impact faculty, the strategic management and innovation standards may have the most direct
impact on the work life of faculty by setting the mission and desired academic outcomes and by
defining both the expectations and indicators of intellectual contributions (IC). Faculty
recruitment, promotion, and tenure decisions will tend to be significantly influenced by the
mission and IC expectations.
10
The second category of standards dealing with participants will also impact faculty.
Participant standards will ultimately drive work load expectations in teaching, scholarship, and
engagement. For example, the teaching load and IC expectations of faculty for an undergraduate
only program will differ significantly from a program offering doctoral degrees. Likewise,
faculty will be directly confronted with the level of academic preparation of the students
admitted.
The third category of standards pertaining to teaching and learning places much of the
responsibility of developing curricula and learning goals to effectively accomplish these goals
directly on faculty. Likewise, assurance of learning and teaching effectiveness standards will
continue to require faculty to “close the loop” in the teaching - > learning - > doing process,
thereby forcing innovation and continuous improvement of teaching to ensure that the learning
objectives are achieved. Significantly, while the 2013 curricula content standards are largely
consistent with the 2003 standards for undergraduate and MBA programs, an important addition
is the explicit discussion of doctoral learning expectations incorporated into the standards
pertaining to curricula content.
The fourth category of standards pertains to engagement with the business program’s
stakeholders, including initiatives like service learning in which students work in the community
to help the less fortunate; executive education, in which the resources of the business program
are used to enhance the managerial skills of a region; and academic engagement through work
with professional associations, editorships, review board memberships, and engaged scholarship
focused ICs. This level of academic and professional engagement coupled with the faculty
member’s academic credentials will be used as an indicator of faculty currency and relevancy.
11
Faculty who were academically qualified under the 2003 standards appear to have more
flexibility in demonstrating the value of their ICs through other measures of impact such as
citations; doctoral qualified faculty who were not considered academically qualified under the
2003 standards will have the opportunity to use professional engagement to demonstrate
currency and relevancy. Non-doctoral faculty who were classified as professionally qualified
will have the opportunity to demonstrate currency and relevancy through either (1) professional
engagement as in the 2003 standards or (2) scholarship.
Faculty will be classified under the 2013 standards into four categories based upon (1)
academic credentials, (2) professional experience, (3) sustained academic engagement as
evidenced by scholarship and academic leadership, and (4) sustained professional engagement.
These faculty categories include (1) scholarly academics, (2) practice academics, (3) scholarly
practitioners, and (4) instructional practitioners. Of course, the “other” or “non-qualified
category serves as a fifth category. Scholarly academics must comprise a minimum of 40 percent
of the instructional faculty, while the proportion of scholarly academics, practice academics, and
scholarly practitioners, must exceed 60 percent of the teaching faculty. Scholarly academics,
practice academics, scholarly practitioners, and instructional practitioners must make up at least
90 percent of the faculty.
Table 1 illustrates the differences in the nature and scope of the 2003 AACSB standards
and the new 2013 AACSB Standards. A careful reading of Table 1 clarifies that, while changes
are numerous, the core foundations of mission-driven academic quality, scholarly contributions,
and outcome assessments remain consistent with the 2003 standards.
TABLE 1 ABOUT HERE
12
The 2013 standards are evolutionary with respect to the 2003 standards, maintaining an
emphasis on strategic management, participants, and learning, while incorporating innovation,
impact, and engagement as critical to the mission of contemporary business schools. For faculty
members, the new standards will shape the curriculum, pedagogy, assurance of learning, research
expectations, and how research impact is measured. In addition, as the standards become
adopted and better understood through the process of reaffirmation and accreditation reviews
over a three-year transition period (AACSB, 2013), it will become more apparent how teaching,
research, and engagement are valued in faculty evaluations and in tenure and promotion
decisions as a trickle-down effect of the new accreditation standards.
The implications for business school faculty and deans of the 2013 standards can be best
understood by examining the core values and guiding principles that underlie the eligibility
criteria for the accreditation process and the four major categories of standards: (1) strategic
management and innovation, (2) participants, (3) learning and teaching, and (4) academic and
professional engagement. One very significant addition to the 2013 standards is the explicit
inclusion of AACSB’s core values as eligibility criteria for accreditation, formalizing and
making very explicit AACSB’s expectations for (1) transparent and ethical behavior by the
students, faculty, and administrators; (2) a collegial environment; and (3) an institutional
commitment towards corporate social responsibility issues. The impact of these values being
made explicit on faculty and deans is illustrated in Table 2.
TABLE 2 ABOUT HERE
Table 3 provides a summary of the implications of each of the 15 standards on faculty
and deans. The purpose here is not to develop an exhaustive list of implications but to highlight
13
some of the more critical implications that may have implications for faculty and deans. An
analysis of the 2003 and 2013 standards suggests that there may be more changes for deans than
academically active and engaged faculty. For example, deans will face additional resources
acquisition burdens arising from Standard 1 pertaining to financial support of the mission; while
academically active and engaged faculty will enjoy additional alternative indicators of evidence
of their IC impact including citation counts, and editorial initiatives. The 2013 standards appear
to be more flexible for faculty, while requiring the deans and university administrators to be ever
more accountable.
TABLE 3 ABOUT HERE
Discussion
The implications of the 2013 AACSB business accreditation standards for faculty are
critical and arguably very positive for engaged and active scholars. For example, active and
engaged scholarly faculty will benefit from a consistent application of the three core values
explicitly discussed in the 2013 standards that include (1) ethics as an expectation, (2) the
requirement for collegiality, and (3) a commitment to social responsibility. While these values
are hallmarks of quality business schools, the values have not been made explicit expectations by
AACSB. Likewise, active and engaged scholarly faculty will appreciate the ability to use
additional indicators of the impact of their career’s intellectual contributions including citations,
editorships, professional leadership positions, and other measures of professional esteem.
All faculty should benefit from the enhanced level of resources mandated by AACSB in
terms of faculty support and professional staffing. In addition, the expectations of AACSB that
14
the mission is shaped by all stakeholders should allow faculty with divergent perspectives on the
role of the business school to have their opinion at least acknowledged.
The implications of the 2013 AACSB accreditation standards for deans are potentially
less positive. While deans have often been on the “firing line” between resource demanding
faculty and even more cost driven administrators, the new standards codify one of the deans’
major duties - that of ensuring that the faculty have resources adequate to support the school’s
mission. During times of shrinking state budgets, and increasing competition for donations,
business school deans will be driven by the new standards to typically acquire more external
financial support.
In addition, deans will become increasingly responsible for organizational characteristics
that, at least in some cases, may be out of their direct control. For example, while deans can
shape culture in a business school, they often face institutional constraints such as faculty and/or
professional staff unions, university repositioning strategies, or even the economic context in
which the university operates that all shape the level of collegiality in a university and its
schools. Likewise, external factors such as culture will impact what is considered ethical in the
globally more interdependent business schools.
Obviously, all of the implications of the new standards on faculty and dean are not yet
known. The evolving context of the global economy, changes in technology, and changes in
regulations will all impact how the standards applied. Future research fruitfully might address
some of the following issues:

How do the new standards impact schools seeking initial accreditation?

Will the new standards impact research schools and teaching schools in differently?
15

Will the global context impact how the new standards are implemented?

How will the new standards impact the doctoral programs?

How will U.S. and international business programs be affected by the new standards?

Will the 2013 standards be more accepting of the culture, process and practices of
international business school and allow AACSB to continue to grow internationally?
Conclusions
Management and business education have been transformed by the economic,
environmental, and social changes that have come about since the turn of the 21st century.
Therefore, business faculty and deans must anticipate additional changes in the coming decade.
Fortunately, the 2013 business accreditation standards are adaptive enough to allow AACSB to
retain its market dominance in both accreditation and policy influence over the next decade.
In this essay, the authors did not attempt to develop an exhaustive list of implications,
rather the paper focused on issues that may have critical and immediate implications for faculty
and deans. Other scholars may choose to consider other implications as the standards are
implemented by AACSB members; however, this essay represents a starting point for
understanding the new 2013 AACSB accreditation standards.
16
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21
Table 1
A Comparison of the 2003 and 2013 AACSB Standards
Standards
Categories of Major Standards
Centrality of Mission to
Accreditation and Reaffirmation
Process
Categories of Standards
Reporting/Metrics
2003 Standards for
Business Accreditation
(AACSB 2003)
Three
Mission is central to the accreditation process;
all performance metrics are a function of
mission.
1. Strategic Management Standards
2. Participant Standards
3. Assurance of Learning Standards
Standard 2 requires Table 2-1, Five-Year
Summary of Intellectual Contributions (by
academic unit and faculty member) and makes
optional Table 2-2, Five-Year Summary of
Peer-Reviewed Journals and Number of
Publications in Each.
Standard 5 calls for a Financial Strategies
Table.
Standard 9 requires Table 9-1, Summary of
Faculty Sufficiency by Discipline and School.
It should be noted that the standard requires at
least 60 percent of the faculty in each
discipline and 75 percent of the faculty in the
school overall to be participating faculty
members.
Standard 10 requires Table 10-1, Summary of
Faculty Qualifications, Developmental
Activities, and Professional Responsibilities
(by academic unit and faculty member) and is
supplemented by academic vitae for all faculty
and Table 10-2, Calculations Relative to the
Deployment of Qualified Faculty. Faculty are
classified as (1) academically qualified (AQ),
(2) professionally qualified (PQ), or (3) other
(O). At least 50 percent of the faculty in each
discipline and overall must be AQ, and at least
90 percent of the faculty in each discipline and
overall must be AQ and PQ.
Standards 16, 18, 19, and 21 required direct
measurement of learning goals.
Process
1.
2.
3.
Mission-driven process
Annual reporting requirement
initially that was eliminated
5-year accreditation lifespan
22
2013 Standards for
Business Accreditation
(AACSB 2013)
Four
Mission and context are central to the accreditation
process; all performance metrics are a function of the
school’s mission and context.
1. Strategic Management and Innovation
2. Participants
3. Learning and Teaching
4. Academic and Professional Engagement
Standard 2 requires Table 2-1, Intellectual
Contributions (in aggregate to reflect organizational
structure).
Standard 3 requires a table to show Financial Support
for Strategic Initiatives.
Standard 8 requires direct measurement of learning
goals but also explicitly allows for indirect measures
of quality.
Standard 15 requires Table 15-1, Faculty Sufficiency
and Qualification Summary for the Most Recently
Completed Normal Academic Year. Table 15-1
refers to Standard 5 for sufficiency in terms of
participating and supporting faculty members. At
least 60 percent of the faculty in each discipline,
location, delivery mode, or program and 75 percent of
the faculty in the school overall must be participating
faculty members.
Standard 15 outlines the qualification requirements
into five categories: (1) scholarly academics (SA),
(2) practitioner academics (PA), (3) scholarly
practitioners (SP), (4) instructional practitioners (IP),
or (5) other (O). SA must comprise at least 40 percent
of the faculty, while SA, PA, and SP must cover least
60 percent of the faculty. SA, PA, SP, and IP must
make up at least 90 percent of the faculty.
Standard 15 also requires Table 15-2, Deployment of
Participating and Supporting Faculty by Qualification
Status in Support of Degree Programs for the Most
Recently Completed Normal Academic Year.
1. Alignment with eligibility criteria required
to show
congruence with AACSB core values and
that the university has the resources and
structures to support an AACSB
accreditation process
2. Mission-driven process
3. 5-year accreditation lifespan
TABLE 2
Three Major Values Explicit in the 2013 AASCB Standards for Business Accreditation and
Illustrative Impacts on Faculty and Deans
AACSB CORE VALUES
The school must encourage and
support ethical behavior by
students, faculty, administrators,
and professional staff.
The school maintains a collegiate
environment in which students,
faculty, administrators, professional
staff, and practitioners interact and
collaborate in support of learning,
scholarship, and community
engagement.
The school must demonstrate a
commitment to address, engage, and
respond to current and emerging
corporate social responsibility issues
(e.g., diversity, sustainable
development, environmental
sustainability, and globalization…)
through its policies, procedures,
curricula, research, and/or outreach
activities.
ILLUSTRATIVE IMPACT ON
FACULITY
The school has processes and policy(ies)
that addresses ethics and that faculty are
aware and adhere to these.
This value has major impact on
faculty. AACSB values a collegial higher
education environment that encourages
academic freedom and innovation.
Collegiality can be defined as a three
dimensional construct that consists of: (1)
mutual support and trust; (2) equity and
politics; and (3) shirking behavior (Miles,
Shepherd, Rose, and Dibben 2013). The
Miles et al. (2013) Faculty Collegiality
Scale provides a psychometrically tested
measure of a business schools level of
collegiality.
This value provides opportunities
for faculty by: (1) shaping curriculum to
be more inclusive of corporate social
responsibility and ethical issues: (2)
influencing recruitment and retention;
and (3) impacting scholarship through
potentially showing preference for
research that addresses some aspect of
corporate social responsibility.
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ILLUSTRATIVE IMPACT
ON DEANS
This codifies the obligations
that the dean has as the
organizational leader in setting
ethical standards and ensuring
that standards are transparently
and consistently followed.
Deans also value a collegial
environment that supports
academic freedom and
innovation but must balance
this with the need for academic
responsibility.
They must consider the impact
of strategic and tactical
decisions on collegiality
including: (1) recruitment; (2)
retention; (3) rewards; (4)
workloads; and (5) resource
allocations.
An understanding of corporate
social responsibility and its
many implications must be
incorporated into the strategy
and processes of the business
school. Implications include:
(1) resource use; (2) travel; (3)
recruitment and retention; (4)
engagement; and (5) access.
Table 3
The 2013AASCB Standards for Business Accreditation and Illustrative Impacts on Faculty
AACSB STANDARDS FOR
BUSINESS ACCREDITION
(AACSB 2013)
1-Mission
ILLUSTRATIVE IMPACT ON FACULTY
Faculty must have input on the development and
review of the college’s mission statement.
The mission is co-created with students,
faculty, alumni, and other stakeholders.
The school’s mission must be linked with and
congruent to its context within a society, region,
and university.
The mission must be explicitly linked with
the broader society, region, and university.
The mission must be supported by required
resources that the faculty can access.
The mission must be linked to expected outcomes
which are typically delivered by the faculty.
2-Intellectual Contributions
Faculty will be expected to produce high-quality
intellectual contributions (IC) that advance
theory, practice, or teaching and are peer
validated and disseminated. The schools
portfolios of ICs includes:
1. Basic scholarship,
2. Applied or engaged scholarship,
3. Scholarship of teaching and learning.
3-Financial Strategies and
Resources
Faculty will be impacted by this standard very
explicitly. Schools with adequate financial
resources will have the funds to support research,
teaching and engagement.
4-Student Admission
The quality, nature and pedagogy of classes are
greatly dependent upon the quality of students
admitted.
Faculty will be (as in the 2003 standards)
classified into participating and supporting
faculty members.
1. Participating faculty are engaged in the
activities of the school and its
governance including scholarship,
service, and external engagement.
2. Supporting faculty members’ primary
role is teaching.
Faculty should understand how teaching and
service workloads are assigned, what research
expectations are, be systematically and formally
reviewed, have formal mentoring programs, and
understand resource allocation decisions and
plans.
Faculty must be supported by an adequate
professional staff to achieve the school’s mission.
5-Faculty Sufficiency
6- Faculty Management &
Support
7-Staff Sufficiency &
Deployment
8-Management of Curricula
and Assurance of learning
ILLUSTRATIVE IMPACT ON DEANS
The department faculty must develop a system to
determine and revise learning goals, the
curriculum to achieve these learning goals and a
control mechanism to provide AOL.
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The dean must acquire and deploy
resources to the faculty that are required to
support the mission.
Business school governance must explicitly
link the mission to faculty performance
expectations.
Deans will have additional indicators of the
impact of their faculty’s IC including:
1. Peer reviewed journal
publications,
2. Citation counts,
3. Editorships,
4. Grants,
5. Visiting appointments, and
6. Leadership in academic bodies.
Deans will have additional pressures to
provide funding to support research,
teaching, and engagement initiatives from
faculty and provide more specific
information to AACSB.
This will impact deans as it relates to their
university’s own growth strategies and
administrator performance expectations.
Deans will have some flexibility in staffing
classes with supporting faculty, but will
largely be required to use fully participating
faculty.
Deans must ensure transparency and good
management practices are followed.
This may conflict with how some
universities are centralizing staff support as
a cost reduction strategy.
Deans are responsible to ensure that an
AOL system with direct assessment is in
place and is effective.
9-Curricula Content
The faculty is responsible for the content of the
curriculum which must have content in both
general skill areas and business management
knowledge areas.
Deans will have to support faculty
initiatives to change the curricula to reflect
AACSB standards.
GENERAL SKILLS:
1. Written and oral communication
2. Ethics
3. Analytical thinking
4. IT
5. Interpersonal relationships and
teamwork
6. Diversity
7. Reflective thinking
8. Ability to apply knowledge
UNDER GRAD GENERAL BUSINESS AREA
1. Economics, and the environment and
context of business
2. CSR
3. Finance
4. Systems and processes
5. Organizational, consumer and
individual behavior
6. IT and quantitative methods
7. Major emphasis knowledge
MBA LEVEL KNOWLEDGE
1. Leadership
2. Managing in a global context
3. Creativity
4. Decision making
5. Knowledge management
10-Student-Faculty
Interactions
11-Degree Program Level,
Structure and Equivalence
12-Teaching Effectiveness
13-Engagement by Students
14-Exectutive Education
DOCTORAL LEVEL KNOWLEDGE
1. Advanced research skills
2. Context understanding
3. Teaching prep
4. Deep mastery of specialty area
Student access to faculty
Faculty will be impacted by “time-to-degree”
deadlines and the teaching model used for in
class, blended and online classes.
Teaching must be systematically evaluated.
How does the curriculum actively engage
students in the learning process?
How is experiential learning used and evaluated?
If executive education is part of the mission how
are faculty involved and engaged in it.
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Deans will have to ensure faculty do not
become “dis-engaged” from students.
Deans will be impacted by their
university’s retention, promotion, and
graduation policy.
Support for developing more effective
teaching must be developed.
Deans must ensure that during faculty
retention, promotion, and tenure decisions
that experiential learning is valued.
Deans will be responsible to ensure that
executive education is of the same quality
as traditional education, if it is a significant
piece of the funding for the business unit.
15-Faculty Qualification and
Engagement
Faculty qualifications will be assessed by:
1. Academic credentials
2. Professional experience
3. Sustained academic engagement as
evidenced by scholarship and academic
leadership
4. Sustained professional engagement.
QUALIFIED FACULTY STATUS – how to
develop and maintain CURRENCY AND
RELEVANCY
1. Scholarly academics – Discipline
relevant doctoral credentials and
relevant and current and sustained
scholarship
2. Scholarly practitioners – Research
currency but lack relevant doctoral
credentials
3. Practice academic - Discipline relevant
doctoral credentials and relevant but
currency and relevance is maintained
by consulting and professional
engagement
4. Instructional practitioners – Hold
significant professional experience and
maintain currency and relevancy
through professional activities.
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Recruiting must reflect the changing
standards.